


Shadow and Light

by FairestCat



Category: A Tale of Time City - Diana Wynne Jones
Genre: Aftermaths, Coda, Gen, Vignette, Yuletide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-16
Updated: 2017-12-16
Packaged: 2019-02-15 12:14:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,320
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13030896
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FairestCat/pseuds/FairestCat
Summary: When the dust, both literal and metaphorical, had settled, and it had been determined that Vivian would stay in Time City - and that her parents might come to stay as well - Vivian Smith's life settled into something of a predictable routine.





	Shadow and Light

**Author's Note:**

  * For [mairelon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mairelon/gifts).



> Thank you to mairelon for giving me a reason to revisit a book I love! This is the first time travel story I ever remember reading and it's still one of my favourites.
> 
> It's not really an adventure, but I hope this satisfies your wish for more of these three.
> 
> Thanks to the_rck for brainstorming fic ideas with me on Discord and [bonibaru](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bonibaru/pseuds/bonibaru) and [oliviacirce](https://archiveofourown.org/users/oliviacirce/pseuds/oliviacirce) for betas and reassurance.

When the dust, both literal and metaphorical, had settled, and it had been determined that Vivian would stay in Time City - and that her parents might come to stay as well - Vivian Smith's life settled into something of a predictable routine.

She and Jonathan met up with Sam and walked to Duration together in the mornings. After lunch they climbed the thousands of stairs of Perpetuum for their lessons with Faber John in Seldom End. Vivian had half-expected their lessons to change, now that Dr. Wilander had remembered that he was Faber John, but he was still the same: both as fascinating and as infuriating as he'd always been.

And often, as the days got warmer, the three of them would sit in Aeon Square after classes, eating butter-pies from the cafe there or fruits and treats picked up from the market stalls in Secular Square.

Aeon Square looked different now. Unlike other parts of Time City, none of the buildings there had fallen down completely in the shaking before the renewal, but many of them had been damaged.There had been a lot of rubble to clean up and work to do stabilizing foundations and replacing facades.

And, of course, there was the hole in the middle of the square left behind when Faber John's Stone crumbled away. Jonathan had repeatedly asked Faber John if a new stone would be put in, but he never gave them a straight answer. Maybe he hadn't given anyone else an answer either, because a month after the renewal there was still a hole in the middle of the square, surrounded by a temporary metal fence. 

Jonathan said the barrier was there to keep tourists from falling in, but Vivian had watched him almost walk into it half a dozen times. She didn't think visitors to Time City were the ones most likely to have trouble remembering that there was a hole in the middle of the square.

Looking at the gap where Faber John’s Stone once lay, she found herself thinking about the moment when it fell apart. She had almost missed seeing it happen because she'd been distracted by the sight of Whilom Tower swaying back and forth in the distance.

"I'm glad it didn't fall," she said distractedly.

"Hmm?" Jonathan glanced up from where he had been idly tearing at the paper wrapping from his butter-pie.

"Whilom Tower." She pointed. "I'm glad it didn't fall down when the city was breaking up. Think of all those films inside."

"What is it with you and films?" said Sam, licking the last of his butter-pie off his chin. "They're not even that interesting."

Vivian sighed and rolled her eyes. She should have known better than to expect Sam to understand. The only films he ever seemed to pay attention to were the terribly boring holos some of the students at Continuum liked to make, showing things like how to get strange foods out of Automats and how to reprogram belts for more credits.

The one time Vivian had tried to show him a film from Twenty Century, he'd become distracted and started taking apart her Deck. She'd only noticed that he'd half-dismantled it when the film suddenly cut off in the middle of the climactic rooftop chase. By the time he had finished putting it back together, it had been too late to finish watching the rest.

She expected Jonathan to understand better, but when she looked at him he just shrugged. "Sure, it would have been sad, but they're just films. It's not like they're real." 

Vivian bristled at the dismissiveness of his tone, so like the haughtiness she'd hated from him when they first met. She'd just opened her mouth to reply when he added, "and I'd rather Whilom Tower had fallen than Millennium and The Years," and suddenly all her hot anger was gone.

Jonathan was taking the architectural destruction that had happened during the renewal particularly hard. When he'd hauled her around the city on that first day, Vivian had thought he was just trying to impress her with the grandeur of Time City. And he definitely had been trying to impress her, but she'd realized later that he'd mostly done it - done everything, from stealing her from time to showing her the city to chasing after the polarities - because he really loved all those grand buildings and impossible wonders. 

He'd even said it, standing outside Faber John's cave: 

_Don't you think this place is worth saving?_

One morning as they'd hurried across the Square she had caught him looking at the gap in the skyline where the great blue glass dome of Millennium had once been. He'd had such a look of unbearable sadness on his face she'd had to turn away. He had the beginning of that look again now.

_Yes, but what's that got to do with me?_ , she remembered replying. _I don't want London to be bombed either._

She had known even then that was an impossible wish. It had taken her weeks to work up the courage to ask Elio how World War II had ended. He'd given her a big book, but she still couldn't bring herself to read it.

"Are there any films about Time City?" she asked, wanting to distract them both.

Jonathan looked up. She could see she'd surprised him. "Why would you want to watch a film about Time City?"

"I'm curious. You took me some places, but there's so much I didn't get to see before the renewal, and now it's all changing. I never even made it to Millennium," she said. "And of course everyone talks about the missing time ghosts, but I never saw most of them in the first place." That had been an unexpected side-effect of the renewal. Time City was now anchored to a new piece of time and all the old ghosts were gone.

"Well, there are tourist films of course," said Jonathan slowly. "I suppose you could get Elio to find you one of the sight-seeing holos."

"Oh, of course there are newsreels," said Vivian. "I should have thought of that. They have those in my time too. They show them in the cinemas before films." 

She was surprised by her own sudden feeling of loss at that thought. _How strange, I still think of it as 'my time' even though I might never be able to go back._

"But what about _real films_?" She'd first brought them up as a distraction, but now she was completely taken by the idea of seeing what kind of films might have been made about Time City. "I bet someone must have made a drama about that once-ghost in Millennium you told me about - the Time Patroller who got shot - it all sounded very dramatic."

"’The Millennium Gambit!’" said Sam, suddenly paying attention again. "Even I've seen that one." He sighed. "It was terribly boring."

"It's not very realistic," Jonathan said, "but Sam's right, everyone in Time City has seen it at least once."

"Well," said Vivian, "that's settled then. I can't miss out on something everyone else has seen. We'll have to watch it tonight after dinner." It still seemed so strange to her that she could just choose the film she wanted and have it show up in her room. It wasn't at all the same as going to the cinema on a Saturday afternoon and watching whatever was showing that week.

"I'm sure I'll be very tired after dinner," said Sam, looking not at all tired.

"Don't worry, I won't make _you_ watch it," said Vivian. "You're not allowed anywhere near my Deck ever again." 

Sam grinned. "How many butter-pies will you give me to stay away?"

Vivian laughed and shoved his shoulder. "You wouldn't dare!"

When she glanced over she saw that Jonathan was laughing too, bright and happy, not looking at the damaged square around them at all.


End file.
